Training Log Archive: Bash

Gator Cup

Well, this was NOT the most fun I've ever had orienteering. With stiff, fatigued legs from yesterday's adventure race, I debated going to the meet at all, but felt it would be good practice before Barebones. It turned out not to be an A meet, but my course was 7 km, so it still should have been a good workout. But the course setter had forgotten to put out our control #1, so a group of us congregated in the right spot and finally decided to move on. Enough time was wasted there on a hot day that it was hard to get enthusiastic about the race after that. I made an executive decision to stop racing at that point. My sprained ankle isn't recovering as quickly as I'd hoped, and I'm getting blisters from both the Active Ankle brace and my new O shoes. So I did much of the course at a brisk trekking pace, with a little jogging, and turned back close to the time cut-off. I noticed a number of people walking in, so I guess I wasn't the only one having a bad day. In retrospect, I wish I'd stayed home and worked on setting the course for the upcoming Caledon Navigators training night.

Event: Emergency Services Adventure Race (ESAR)
 

ESAR is an adventure race targeted at police, firefighters, paramedics and the military, but they allow a small number of civilian teams to enter. Like last year, I raced on a female team - Tree Huggers from Venus - with Luscious and Gorgeous. This was their 2nd adventure race. Gorgeous has been injured and unable to train, but she is strong. As a result of her preparations for last year's ESAR race, Luscious has discovered a talent for trail running, but she's not too keen on biking, especially the technical stuff. So... when we saw the course with 45 km of biking, including a good amount of off-trail riding, we didn't set our hopes too high.

We had a mass start from the Albion HIlls Chalet, heading through 8 km of single and double track trails in a pack of riders. I knew this wouldn't be a strong section for us, so I'd started halfway back in the pack and warned my teammates to expect to be passed and not to get discouraged by it. We were pinning our hopes on the two trekking sections. We rode up to Palgrave, where we did a 4-control orienteering course several kilometers long. As expected, there was some advantage in having O skills - and in living practically next door! When we started, we were told we were in the middle of the pack, and when we finished, we were in the top 10 of 74 teams!

We biked to Glen Haffy, then rode 3 km through the conservation area on rocky, muddy trails. Another short distance on a park road brought us to our first "special task". We were sent down to the stocked trout ponds, where we were given 15 minutes to catch a fish! If we caught one earlier, we could leave earlier. Members of a local fishing club assisted with bait, instruction and removing fish from hooks, then they cleaned the fish and put them in a cooler with our team number so we could take them home after the race. Gorgeous works for an animal welfare organization, so she took a break. I'm a complete novice, and I started off on my own and had no success for 5 minutes. Then I convinced Luscious to pick up a rod as well, and she caught an 11" fish within a minute, and we were out of there! We had more riding then, including a rather kamikaze crossing of Hwy 9, followed by lots of hilly terrain.

There was another special task where there were 54 flags of different colours stuck in a random arrangement in a small area of grass, and we had to count them from a distance. We got a penalty in minutes equal to the number by which we were above or below the correct number. We did a quick, but reasonable job, and got a 1 minute penalty, which was handy for having a snack. The team of police officers who arrived ahead of us were being so careful to count accurately that they were still there when we left - better to take a small penalty!

We rode to Island Lake Conservation Area, where we paddled to 3 checkpoints around the lake, then headed to Goodyear Scout Camp to drop our bikes for the final trek. We had a big climb, then stayed high and discovered a dirt lane that led all the way to the road we'd expected to bushwhack to. It was a steep run downhill to the Bruce Trail, then we had 2 km of hilly terrain, passing by the top of the ski lifts at Hockley Valley. There were two special tasks at the finish line - a cimbing wall and a stretcher carry, then we were done - phew! A much more physical race than last year's ESAR - and hot weather too. 'Bent greeted us with the best-tasting ice cold beer I've ever had. We were 1st female team of 12 teams, and 9th overall of 74 teams. Woo hoo! I'm so proud of my teammates.

More details in 'Bent's log soon, but we'd been hearing updates throughout the race about his team, Tree Huggers Generations. He raced with two teenagers - VO2 Max and Brittany Webster (no cool AP nickname yet). It was their first adventure race, but they are both on the national cross-country ski team development squad. They led for most of the race, and finished in 1st place overall!! This is 'Bent's 2nd consecutive ESAR win - yahoo! The top male team included Gazelle and The Padre, so Tree Huggers were on the top male, female and coed teams overall. Great day, but I am exhausted, and I'm running F-Elite in the Gator Cup tomorrow morning. Yikes.

Rest day before ESAR tomorrow. Nasty weather today anyway, and it looks like tomorrow will be excellent - if a bit warm.

Last night was the first GHO Rogaining Workshop, in preparation for the North American Rogaining Champs in Allegany State Park in two weeks. HammerDad and I were the presenters, and there were 21 workshop attendees - twice as many as I'd originally estimated. After our presentations and discussion, HammerDad gave us a great exercise to optimize our points per kilometer for a 22 km distance - and the competition between teams got quite intense. Lots of fun, and I think there may have been a few new rogaine addicts in the crowd!

There will be 30+ people at the Champs from the GHO rogaining e-mail list, including adventure racers, a Mom and her daughters, trail runners, and two senior orienteers doing their first rogaine. Should be an awesome time, and we'll do plenty of cheering for other members of the Ontario contingent.

Trail run around the Palgrave red trail and home again. Legs felt great and pace was good, but I had to take off my magic Active Ankle after 45 minutes because it gave me a blister - actually 4 blisters. It's surprising it took this long to happen, but now I know where to tape up when I wear it. I would still prefer to have it on - the ankle isn't healed yet, and it will take awhile to get back to full strength. Beowulf says it will take several months of balance exercises to regain my proprioception.

BulletDog was a great running partner and is now snoring on the couch. ThunderDog was annoyed to be left behind, so she emptied the kitchen garbage pail and ate a few inedibles.

With my recent ankle sprains, I haven't been able to keep up with my leg strength routine, and I've missed doing it. Not only that, I was falling behind on my knowledge of American politics, but watching the Daily Show has brought me back up to date.

There really wasn't time to run before tonight's meeting, so I did a quick loop in Palgrave West at sprint pace. I took Poison Ivy Trail near the start and discovered that a healthy crop of its namesake plant had sprouted in the recent rain, so I'll need to divert to other trails for the next few months. Too bad I wore shorts today...

Trail run in Palgrave West with ThunderDog. It was so cool out that I could have run for hours - but I had an O club meeting to attend, so this one had to be short.

I tried to promote the idea that holiday Mondays were exempt from our Hard Core Monday routine, but 'Bent (who has skipped a couple of Mondays recently) talked me into it. It actually felt good after 7.5 hours in the car.